Deja Vu
Review by Fritz Esker
Déjà vu, the new film by director Tony Scott (Top Gun, True Romance), was the first movie to be filmed in post-Katrina New Orleans. While the film acknowledges the existence of Katrina with a few lines of dialogue and a brief trip into the ruins of the Lower 9th Ward, it really has nothing to do with the storm.
Denzel Washington plays Doug Carlin, an ATF agent investigating a ferry explosion on Mardi Gras Day. An FBI agent (Val Kilmer) asks Washington to join a special investigative force that, due to a new and secret technology, can glimpse four days into the past, but for one time only (no rewinds). So, the alert mind of Washington’s character is needed to spot any clues that can lead to capture of the terrorist (Jim Caviezel). In watching the past, Washington becomes smitten with a woman (Paula Patton) whose murder may be connected to the explosion.
Of course, Washington’s character will want to test the machine and travel back in time to save the victims. In this regard, the film Déjà vu most closely resembles is Steven Spielberg’s outstanding 2002 film Minority Report, in which detectives stopped crimes before they happened. However, since Déjà vu involves time travel, it suffers from the same logical fallacies that befall even the best time travel movies (Back to the Future, The Terminator, 12 Monkeys).
That being said, Déjà vu is at least diverting for most of its running time. While it may not be spectacular, for its first 90 minutes, it is watchable. The filmmakers admirably treat New Orleans with respect and avoid any ridiculous The Big Easy-style caricaturing of the city and its inhabitants. The film’s best scene actually manages to inject new vigor and life into that musty old action film standby, the car chase, as present-day Washington ends up chasing an image from the past in his vehicle (it’s hard to explain, but really cool to watch on film). Another pleasant surprise is that Tony Scott, normally a director whose visuals are incredibly overbearing and headache-inducing, actually shows a good deal of restraint here.
However, the film actually bogs down once Washington takes the leap and travels back in time. At that point, it just becomes predictable and it feels as if the film’s forward momentum has completely stopped. Despite this flaw, however, Déjà vu is a moderately entertaining film, one that is not one of the best of its genre, but should still make for a decent rental or viewing on cable TV.